Category: Awards

Von Hoffmanns All Round!

Jim Newell runs down all the worst primary predictions, including yours truly. Yes, my Palin paranoia got the better of me at times, but I did cop to my error (and was thrilled by it). Dish fave:

Bill Kristol, the publisher of the neoconservative Weekly Standard, is the most notoriously wrong-all-the-time political commentator in America.

The vocal advocate behind such hits as "the Iraq war will go swimmingly" and "Sarah Palin would be a great vice presidential candidate" typically spent most of this campaign season incorrectly speculating, or "reporting," on which candidates would join the race. In a way, this made Kristol useful. We knew, for example, that a Rudy Giuliani for President 2012 campaign — however unlikely that ever was — would definitely never materialize after Bill Kristol wrote this on June 8, 2011: "I’m told by two reliable sources that Rudy Giuliani intends to run for the GOP nomination for president in 2012. He may throw his hat in the ring soon."

A sad excuse: Romney was so obviously the likely candidate we hacks did our best to come up with other possible scenarios. It was called "keeping hope awake."

Hewitt Award Nominee

"In the late 19th century, Bismark [sic] waged his “Kulturkamf,” [sic], a culture war against the Roman Catholic Church, closing down every Catholic school and hospital, convent and monastery in Imperial Germany. Clemenceau, nicknamed “the priest eater,” tried the same thing in France in the first decade of the 20th Century. Hitler and Stalin, at their better moments, would just barely tolerate some churches remaining open, but would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services, and health care. In clear violation of our First Amendment rights, Barack Obama – with his radical, pro abortion and extreme secularist agenda, now seems intent on following a similar path," – Bishop Daniel Jenky. 

Words fail. It is not encouraging when a reference to nineteenth century Germany cannot get the spelling of Bismarck or Kulturkampf right. But this is the current hierarchy. They weren't selected for their intelligence, which, after all, could be a liability. They were selected for their subservience to their superiors.

And the good, if intellectually challenged, Bishop is comparing a deliberate policy of minority Catholic persecution in Germany in the nineteenth century, when thousands of Catholics were thrown in jail, with a tiny provision in the first universal healthcare law in America (a longstanding Catholic goal) that would include contraception in health insurance paid for by the insurance company. No woman would be forced to use it. And yet 98 percent of Catholic women still consult their consciences and do. The Vatican's own commission on the subject came to the same conclusion as these Catholic women – only to be vetoed by one celibate man, Pope Paul VI. If this is a totalitarian attack on religious freedom, then I am a proud heterosexual.

What it actually is is a dyspeptic eruption from an all-male "celibate" hierarchy about the loss of its power over its employees, Catholic and non-Catholic. And it is a terribly depressing sign that the Catholic hierarchy, like much of the evangelical leadership, is now in danger of becoming a front for one political party.

Moore Award Nominee

"We've got to do something about these Asians coming in, opening up businesses — those dirty shops … They ought to go. I'll just say that right now, you know. But we need African-American businesspeople to be able to take their places, too," – Marion Barry, running in yet another election.

Hewitt Award Nominee

A momentary but vile visual at the 0:39 mark:

Alex Klein is queasy:

Rick Santorum just released an incredibly weird campaign ad, complete with empty playgrounds, spinning clocks, and ghostly daguerreotypes. But beyond dystopia, there's something else that's deeply off-putting about the video: a rapid jump cut between the faces of President Obama and Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

In a subsequent post spotlighting Herman Cain's latest piece of performance art, Klein comments: "There must be something in the water, as kooky, creepy, post-modern dystopia is becoming a common theme in a lot of Republican ads."

Hewitt Award Nominee

"Iranian agents have successfully infiltrated American think-tanks, universities, and our political system as part of a plot to keep the United States from attacking the Islamic regime as it continues to expand terrorism worldwide and pursue its nuclear weapons and missile programs. The infiltration goal is to mold American opinion and create doubt about the advisability of attacking Iran's nuclear facilities — all part of a longstanding strategy to pull the strings of America and the West," – Reza Khalil, The American Thinker.

Moore Award Nominee

"I love abortion. I don't accept it. I don't view it as a necessary evil. I embrace it. … [T]here is no need to suggest that abortion be rare. To say so implies a value judgement, promoting the idea that abortion is somehow distasteful or immoral and should be avoided," - Jessica DelBalzo.

Hewitt Award Nominee

"Yes, Obama has been very tough on al-Qaeda overseas, but that has made it far easier for him to embrace the Muslim Brotherhood (both overseas and here at home). This makes perfect sense, actually: the Muslim Brotherhood is to al Qaeda as Alinsky was to the Weathermen — the bloodthirsty and ultimately ineffective Islamists are giving way to the sophisticated, competent, highly effective Islamists," – Andy McCarthy, National Review.